The heir and future master of Burgsdorf, who had just been reprimanded
so sharply, sat opposite his mother, listening, as in duty bound, while
he helped himself liberally to ham and eggs. He was a handsome,
fresh-looking youth, about seventeen years old, whose appearance
indicated no great intellectual strength, but he seemed to beam with
good nature. His sun-burned face was the picture of health, but
otherwise he showed little resemblance to his mother. He lacked her
energetic expression, and the blue eyes and blonde hair were not from
her, but were an inheritance from his father. With his large, but very
awkward limbs, he looked like a young giant, and formed a striking
contrast to his more delicately formed, aristocratic looking uncle,
Wallmoden, who sat next him, and who said now with a slight soupcon of
irony in his tone: "You certainly cannot hold Willibald answerable for
all these mad pranks; he certainly is a model son."